"My father has told the story," Mary said. "He was coming out of the hospital, going to tell my grandparents of my safe arrival.

"Dad said people were dancing and singing in the street, big celebrations. His first though was ... 'surely that can't be just because a daughter was born?" She was their second child, with a son born three years earlier.

Mary was born at Stratharlie private hospital in Wynter Street. Her mother Joyce was a Nelson, of Nelson's hardware store. Her father John (jack) was a gunner during the war but was back in Taree for Mary's birth, after stints in hospital in South Australia and Concord (Sydney).

The matron at the hospital suggested the newborn should be named "Victoria Peace", marking victory and the end of the war.

However she was named Mary Elizabeth, after her grandmothers Mary Nelson and Elizabeth Hooper.

Mary left Taree when she was 15 and now lives at Hill Top in the Southern Highlands.